This was the moniker of the Rallye Sport group of fast Fords and the RS badge has become as important to Ford globally as HSV is to Holden in Australia.

Of course, Australia hasn’t always been treated to the best of these little Fords. Thanks to our previous preoccupation with big engines and full-sized cars, the whole small performance-car and hot-hatch thing kind of passed us by.

But with the recent shift in interest to smaller cars with more inherent efficiency and more city-friendly layouts, the idea of a hot small car makes all sorts of sense.

And within the pantheon of high-performance tiddlers, the Focus RS that arrived in 2010 must surely take some beating.

Yes, there’s a newer hot Focus on the market now, the current-shape Focus ST, and while it’s a great car in most regards (and better than the RS in some regards, too) it lacks both the visual impact and the searing performance of the previous-gen RS.

It also lacks the exclusivity; just 315 Focus RSs were imported to Australia, many in lurid colours such as a vibrant green.

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To make the Focus RS, Ford took a three-door focus body shell and re-engineered large sections of it.

The familiar Volvo-derived five-cylinder engine retained its 2.5-litre capacity, but with a bigger turbocharger than the other hot Focus of the time, the XR5 Turbo, for much more boost, power jumped to 224kW with torque a mighty 440Nm.

Ordinarily, so much torque driving through just the front wheels (as was the case) would create a car that was almost undriveable under power because it would be wheelspinning or torque steering (where the wheel pulls to one side under acceleration).

But Ford’s RS engineers came up with a clever front-end that altered the suspension geometry to suit and threw in an equally smart front differential.

All up, the Focus RS was still incredibly powerful for a front-drive hatch, but it was tamed to the point where it could be driven very quickly on a race-track (which is where plenty of them ended up, but we’ll get to that).

And while the engine still had that distinctive five-cylinder beat to it, when the driver dropped the hammer, acceleration was explosive.

The ride was pretty firm, and the RS was hardly a quiet cruiser, but the other thing working against it as an everyday car was a lack of standard equipment.

At a time when all $60,000 cars sported cruise control and sat-nav, the European-specified (and German-built) Focus RS had neither.

Neither was there a choice of automatic transmission and a six-speed manual was your lot. That said, any other type of transmission was probably missing the point of the RS in the first place.

But the car did get the sporty touches you might expect with body-hugging Recaro seats, a massive body kit including a truly outrageous rear wing and big, 19-inch alloy wheels and high-performance tyres that pushed the track out 40mm over the standard Focus.

So what’s not to like?

It’s an interesting question and the only disappointed owner is one who buys the wrong example or who has bought the wrong model Focus in the first place.

The wrong Focus RS is likely to be the one that has spent most weekends since 2010 being flogged around a race-track.

These were superb track-day cars, but there are enough that have never seen the wrong- side of pit-lane that we’d recommend buying one of those.

This is not to say that a tracked car will be worn out, but it could be closer to that status than a pampered, babied example.

Check for scratched rims (not so much against gutters but where many tyres have been changed) and holes in the floor under the carpet for roll-cage mounting as dead give-aways that the car has seen active track duty.

But other clues are lock-wired drain plugs on the engine and gearbox, semi-slick tyres and performance brake-pads.

The RS we’d really steer clear of is one that has been modified under the bonnet for even more performance.

With an engine that was running very high turbo-boost from the factory, any attempt to turn the wick up could have serious ramifications when it comes to reliability and engine longevity.

There’s also the registration and insurance issues such modifications throw up.

There’s also the chance that a Focus RS is simply the wrong car for some people.

If you can’t live without sat-nav and cruise-control and the firm ride and noise levels are likely to bother you, then there are softer – but still quick – alternatives out there that are probably a better fit.

The XR5 Turbo is a more soothing device, but still misses out on cruise-control. But at least it’s a five-door hatch where the RS is strictly a three-door car.

Also, get a quote from your insurer before shelling out the cash.

The reputation and statistics surrounding cars such as the Focus RS can make them prohibitively expensive to insure depending on who you are, how old you are and what your driving record is like.